Information

The LVHA is a volunteer organization that sponsors many events and provides financial support to civic activities in Lathrup. It also publishes a resident telephone directory on an annual basis.

The association's open meetings are usually held at 7 p.m. on the second Wednesday of the month.

Dates to remember:

The association's college scholarship essay contest has a postmark deadline of Saturday, June 9. Click here for information.

The association-sponsored annual New Resident Picnic is being planned for late summer or early fall.

Contact the association at lathrupvillagehomeowners@gmail.com.

Lathrup Village Children's Garden

Welcome to the Lathrup Village Children’s Garden! Our 4,000 square foot “Adopt a Plot” garden is located behind the Lathrup Village Municipal Building. This garden, “Where Children Blossom and Grow,” has become a showplace in our community, filled with flowers and plants, as well as arbors, benches, and garden art. Our 2013 season was marked by the addition of five metal windmill flower sculptures. This project was funded through a generous donation from the Lathrup Village Community Foundation. These sculptures not only gained recognition from our local residents, but they were also featured in the 2014 Annual issue of Lifestyle Magazine for the Greater Southfield Area. The Lathrup Village Childrens Garden has been a place where children and adults of all ages can connect with the wonders of nature.

Since its inception in 2001, our organization has planned and implemented more than 150 programs and activities. We have exciting future plans for the garden which include a new bridge, a living wall ecosystem, a checkerboard garden, and new garden landscapes. We would like to invite you and your family to become a part of our garden family.

The Lathrup Village Historical Society is a charitable, nonprofit organization for people interested in the history and preservation of the heritage of the City of Lathrup Village. The Society promotes the recognition and preservation of historically significant structures within the city and collects, organizes, preserves and restores material about Lathrup Village.

The Society was formed in 1992 after a group of residents tried unsuccessfully to save the Town Hall, the Southfield Rd. business headquarters of city founder Louise Lathrup Kelley, from demolition.

Much of the city of Lathrup Village was placed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1998. The historic district includes approximately 1,200 properties, primarily residential, that reflect characteristic housing styles from the first half of the 20th Century. These include Colonial Revival, Tudor and ranch houses. The district is also considered significant due to its planning and its pioneering developer, Louise Lathrup Kelley. “As a woman acting as developer starting in the 1920s, she was essentially alone, however her dogged persistence and insistence on quality resulted in a unique community that was the summation of her career.” (Source: Michigan State Historic Preservation Office)

Louise Lathrup Kelley (1893-1963) was an American businesswoman and land developer who planned and developed what is now the city of Lathrup Village, Michigan. In 1923, Louise and her mother Annie began buying land in a then-rural area of Southfield Township in Oakland County, Michigan, north of Detroit. The area was thought to be strategically located because of its elevation, centrality, roads and transportation.

In 1924, Louise built herself a 10,000-square-foot home on a 6.5-acre tract, which became known as the House in the Woods. The first house in Louise Lathrup’s California Bungalow Subdivisions was built in 1925 on a street named Bungalow. Development slowed during the Great Depression, picked up in 1937 and accelerated after World War II.

In 1953, Lathrup Village became a 1.5-square-mile city. It is situated east and west of Southfield Rd. and north and south of the I-696 expressway. The first city offices were located in the House in the Woods, where they remained until 1962. The house was destroyed by fire in 2009.